Mobile tech group takes AIM

18/04/2006 Robert Tyerman

China-focused mobile value-added services specialist IGM plans to float on AIM with a £14.5 million funding before July.

With a head office in Guangzhou in southern China, IGM provides 'premium community-based communications, entertainment and multimedia services' to mobile network operators in the fast-growing markets of China, Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia and Taiwan. Co-founder Philip Cheung Ling Wong, 30, is chief executive officer of the company, which more than doubled net profits to £1.35 million last year on revenues up 70 per cent to £3.15 million.

He plans to use the funding proceeds for 'geographical expansion and technological development'. The bait, for the company and its backers, is the potential in China, where market penetration is as yet low and Wong sees demand for mobile value-added services growing 42 per cent compound annually for the next three years.

India is next in line, with Indonesia and other Asian markets further down the track, followed by South America and the USA. Wong, a former executive with Hong Kong-listed Fortune Telecom, is complemented by non-executive chairman Royston Hoggarth, who chairs British cheque processing concern iPSL, and chief financial officer Kim Seng Teh, a director of Singapore-listed Flextech Holdings.

Libertas Capital is handling the fund raising for IGM, which has not yet been priced. It is likely to attract investors' interest.

If you are not yet a subscriber you can get immediate access to all the services on Growth Company Investor simply by clicking here.